A row over human rights in Saudi Arabia will not have any impact on Saudi oil supplies to Canada, its energy minister said, reassuring customers after Riyadh froze new trade with Canada and ruled out mediation efforts.

I wonder what else in foreign affairs this bunch of louts will fumble?

Or will they retreat, and bandage their burnt fingers?

Is this government good at ANYTHING?

TC seems to think that if we can still buy their oil, it's OK. I think of the $15 billion's worth of high tech industrial jobs we endanger. I guess that's the difference between or points of view.

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Say what you will, the Ambassador, who serves at Justin's pleasure and (in that sense) is part of Justin's gang, is the one who mouthed off about the sad plight of Saudi women. (I mean, until 1960 they had slaves. Our ambassador was there to remind them that a vacuum cleaner and a microwave is no replacement for a couple of slaves.).

It turns out that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is in the midst of a crackdown against dissidents. It's in the middle of a war.

And Samar -- who just got Canadian citizenship on Canada Day of this year, a month ago -- is nothing if not an activist and a dissident. She's supposedly intelligent, but not smart enough to avoid this.

Maybe it would be another country ... oh, say Portugal ... if they had an ambassador that's that stupid.

Except what are the chances the ambassador acted on his own on this? Zip! If he did this on his own authority, he ought to be horsewhipped.

"“Canada is gravely concerned about additional arrests of civil society and women’s rights activists in Saudi Arabia, including Samar Badawi, We urge the Saudi authorities to immediately release them and all other peaceful human rights activists.” Canadian Government statement.

"“Canada is gravely concerned about additional arrests of civil society and women’s rights activists in Saudi Arabia, including Samar Badawi, We urge the Saudi authorities to immediately release them and all other peaceful human rights activists.” Canadian Government statement.

There was a Canadian ambassador's speech that was identified as the cause of the problem originally. Frankly, I think real diplomacy accepts that there will be a public position that is different from the actual position. So I don't think this statement caused anything. It might have been an attempt to appeal to Saudi public opinion, but that means Saudi Arabia was right to expel him.

Ottawa faces its own screw-up, which was entirely predictable. Let's be clear -- the rest of the world thinks (rightly) that the Canadian efforts were an interference in the internal politics of Saudi Arabia. We all suffer for Justin's vanity!

This is just one of the ways you lose a trade war.

Quote:

​'The new norm': Diplomat says Canada may need to get used to being alone on world stage

"I confess that I'm very disappointed by it," said Anthony Cary, a former British High Commissioner to Canada.

"There was a time when Canada could have rightly expected to receive the core support from the United States and from the United Kingdom, as its closest partners," he said in interview with CBC News from his home in London.

While Canada's foreign affairs minister Chrystia Freeland is reaching out to her international counterparts in private, a gaping hole in public solidarity lingers over the Saudi affair.

Earlier this week, the British Foreign Office issued just a three-line statement that read in part: "Canada and Saudi Arabia are both close partners … and we urge restraint."

The U.S. urged Canada to go it alone.

"Both sides need to diplomatically resolve this together. We can't do it for them," said U.S. State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert.

'Weakening' of solidarity
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) lashed out at Canada, after Global Affairs and Freeland published tweets calling for the release of recently jailed human rights activists.

In a matter of days, KSA expelled Canada's ambassador in Riyadh, recalled its own ambassador from Ottawa, ordered students in Canada to return home, ceased purchases of Canadian wheat and grain and said there would be no new trade trade deals with Canada. Other sanctions followed.

What will happen to Saudi students enrolled in Canada?
Saudi Arabia pulls its medical patients from Canadian hospitals
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has rejected calls to apologize, while vowing to continue to stand up for human rights.

"We have seen a weakening of the sort of solidarity that I think would have been taken for granted a few years ago," said Cary.

We are becoming diplomatically down-graded, that's for sure. Trust me, other foreign services have noticed that it's no longer certain that the US will back up Canada. They know we don't have to respect the pretentiousness of our foreign policy that comes half the time with Liberal administration. (ThinK of ... (shudder) ... the insipid Lloyd Axworthy!) Does anyone remember Trudeau Sr's -- I call him the "real" Trudeau -- foreign policy? It was the diplomatic equivalent of John and Yoko on their bed tour. And accomplished nothing except introduce the real Trudeau to State Dinners, African style.

It started out with wonderful goals, but it has never led to good diplomacy. And now, it's questionable if the goals are worthy.

If our government is stiff-necked about this, we should prepare to be treated like any other nation of 33 million with an obsolete military ... it amounts to 'weight' -- the ability to mobilize and use power and influence ... now we are transitioning to having the same international weight as Poland or Morrocco, perhaps. If you look at a list of nations with populations of 30 to 40 million, and no effective military, it's not an influential crowd.

I don't say we will get there. But that's the direction of change. We have been demoted, and this is the first sign of it.

Blame it on our goofy government or not, it's something the public wants to see some push-back on.

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